CMUNCE Day 4: Secretary-General Interview

by Ryan on January 17, 2011

KFC and I had a chance to interview Secretary-General Rhonda Shafei of the Columbia Model United Nations Conference & Exposition (CMUNCE). We were very impressed with her thoughtful views on the value of Model UN and how it’s influenced CMUNCE’s conscientious choice to be a crisis-based conference.

My favorite line is at 1:25 (paraphrased below):

“People tend to cast Model UN as not realistic at all — a practiced form of debate — but it’s something that does translate to the real world.

A lot of the events that have shaped the first decade of the second millennium have come out of nowhere. And how do we respond to those things?

We can read textbooks in school or follow the trajectory of history the best that we can, but through debate and practicing something at the moment — at happenstance — that’s how we become more innovative, become more creative, and form the future generation of leaders and thinkers.”